is more
inactive, swallowed peacefully the tranquil, lazy mollusks.

Farther down were Greenland anamaks, long and dark; huge sperm-whales,
swimming in the midst of ambergris, in which took place thomeric
battles that reddened the ocean for many miles around; the great
Labrador tegusik. Sharp-backed dolphins, the whole family of seals and
walruses, sea-dogs, horses and bears, lions and elephants, seemed to
be feeding on the rich pastures; and the doctor admired the numberless
animals, as he would have done the crustacea in the crystal basins of
the zoological garden.

What beauty, variety, and power in nature! How strange and wonderful
everything seemed in the polar regions!

The air acquired an unnatural purity; one would have said it was full
of oxygen; the explorers breathed with delight this air, which filled
them with fresher life; without taking account of the result, they
were, so to speak, exposed to a real consuming fire, of which one can
give no idea, not even a feeble one. Their emotions, their breathing
and digestion, were endowed with superhuman energy; their ideas became
more excited; they lived a whole day in an hour.

Through all these wonders the launch pushed on before a moderate
breeze, occasionally feeling the air moved by the albatrosses' wings.

Towards evening, the coast of New America disappeared beneath the
horizon. In the temperate zones, as well as at the equator, night
falls; but here the sun simply described a circle parallel to the line
of the horizon. The launch, bathed in its oblique rays, could not lose
sight of it.

The animate beings of these regions seemed to know the approach of
evening as truly as if the sun had set; birds, fish, cetacea, all
disappeared. Whither? To the depths of the ocean? Who could say? But
soon total silence succeeded to their cries, and the sound of their
passage through the water; the sea grew calmer and calmer, and night
retained its gentle peace even beneath the glowing sun.

Since leaving Altamont Harbor the launch had made one degree to the
north; the next day nothing appeared on the horizon, neither
projecting peaks nor those vague signs by which sailors detect their
nearness to land.

The wind was good, but not strong, the sea not high; the birds and
fish came as thick as the day before; the doctor, leaning over the
gunwale, could see the cetacea rising slowly to the surface; a few
icebergs and scattered pieces of ice alone broke the monotony o